Some Perspective

Hat Tip.

Herf Wows the State Department

Friend of dcat Jeffrey Herf recently gave a talk at the State Department on progressive foreign policy and radical Islam. The New Republic has republished his provocative speech.
As with everything Jeff writes this is smart and provocative. I have my qualms, especially with regard to the idea that the Obama administration does not talk enough (or loudly enough) about the dangers of radical Islam. Eight years of Bush administration bombast was damaging enough, thank you very much. It's not what you say so much as what you do as you say it. Nonetheless, his piece is very much worth reading.

Herf v. Wolin: Heavyweights Square Off

This article on "the long, toxic afterlife of Nazi propaganda in the Arab world" by my friend and former professor Jeffrey Herf in The Chronicle of Higher Education prompted a, let's say "spirited" rejoinder from the historian Richard Wolin. The Chronicle then brought the two together, in a manner of speaking, for an "exchange." Read it all.

Containing the Radicals

Via Andrew Sullivan, Andrew Bacevich has proposed a policy of containment toward radical Islam. It's a policy you might suspect that I would agree with. Why might you suspect this? Because I made a similar argument in an op-ed piece for History News Network. In January 2006.